That had the Villa Park fans rocking before Jose Mourinho’s side were another man down when Willian’s fellow Brazilian Ramires was given his marching orders for a horror injury-time tackle on Karim El Ahmadi.

The 1-0 loss has Chelsea sitting just four points above second-placed Liverpool and third-placed Arsenal, who both have a game in hand, while fourth-placed Manchester City are just six points behind with three extra fixtures to play.

Arsenal kept up appearances with a 1-0 victory over North London enemies Tottenham courtesy of Tomas Rosicky’s fine second-minute strike at White Hart Lane while Manchester City managed to beat Hull City 2-0 at the KC Stadium.

Manuel Pellegrini’s side shrugged off the early loss of captain Vincent Kompany to a red card to score either side of the break. David Silva opened the scoring in the 14th minute with a stunning curler from range before Edin Dzeko neatly finished a stunning through ball from the Spaniard in the final minute.